Remember Lightworks? It is a new non-linear editor, that is available for Windows and Linux. What's unique about it is that the basic version is available for free and the pro one costs only $60 per year! And it has some nice features too - Lightworks Pro includes advanced codec support, shared projects, stereoscopic support, titling, hardware I/O support and Pro membership of the Lightworks Community. A good alternative to other NLEs, but now also an alternative to Final Cut Pro, as the Mac version is coming soon and EditShare, the company behind this tool, is demonstrating the Mac version for the first time at NAB 2013 in Las Vegas (stand SL9010). And so it will be the first NLE to be truly tri-platform (Windows, Linux and Mac). There will also be a Q&A session in the stand’s theatre area hosted by Scott Hill, long-time Lightworks user and renowned Hollywood editor.

Scott Hill, whose well-known body of work includes Zookeeper and Bruce Almighty, believes the new version will have a big impact: “Introducing Lightworks as native software on Mac will be a game-changer in Hollywood,” said Hill. “Professionals will once again have a legitimate and powerful option in choosing their editing system, since so many facilities are outfitted with Macs."

Time will tell if Lightworks will be successful on Macs - the price tag is surely nice, but the software is not as advanced as FCPX or Premiere Pro yet and plugins also play an important factor when you want to find the perfect NLE for you. Anyway competition is a good thing, so it will be nice to find out what Lightworks for Mac OS X will offer. It is also worth adding, that the Lightworks 11.1 Linux Public Beta testing will go live on April 30, 2013 and the full version of the all-new Lightworks for Windows (version 11.1) will also be released on April 30, 2013.

There are also some exciting new features coming in the near future:

Added support for AJA I/O hardware

Support for screen capture using the record panel

An improved import panel: now behaves similarly to bins, mark/park clips before import